The issue is that it's expensive, and many agencies don't have that kind of money. I was told Louisa only got it because it's grant-funded.
), but for a rural county like Louisa that can be a big chunk of money. The maintenance costs are a lot less; I think just a couple of thousand dollars per year (but again, this was 2015-ish, so prices have certainly changed since).
Well that sucks. I use them to keep updated on traffic for work.
Honestly that doesn't surprise me. I don't think PulsePoint is actually working very well for a lot of agencies. The limitations are just too significant. I don't know about other localities, but around here they only send out notifications for CPR needed in public places. While I understand why they don't send out notifications for private residences, that's where most cardiac arrests happen.
Oh yeah, people definitely use it for that, but that's not why departments deploy it. The PulsePoint pitch, and the reason it was created, is to alert people trained in CPR that someone nearby needs it so they can assist. I imagine many departments are ambivalent at best about the incident display. CFD didn't care (when I was there), because we didn't have any problems with people showing up on calls or anything like that. But not all departments are as pragmatic as CFD is/was. Even CFD doesn't publish incidents that originate as LE calls and have stopped publishing geolocations for medicals at private residences. I also see lots of screenshots showing up on social media, which makes it even less attractive to many departments with a less pragmatic viewpoint, and maybe even some that are. The line between the public's right to know and patient and responder safety is a delicate one to walk.
